Weathertap Radarlab HD

[Gene Moore]

We would like to add more detailed roads to RadarLab HD, but that is a lot of data to load and we haven't come up with a good way to allow this. It might be an option some time in the future.

I've been testing the new upgraded version with velocity and I like it, good work! Over GRLevelX I like the convenience of having a full package with everything already on board. That is, I can switch to satellite overlay without changing programs and have the same scaled background as the radar. Likewise with surface obs, county names, warnings and the roads, nice. The contouring looks good until zoomed in too much then we start to return to a blocky pattern. I still don't think you have quite the resolution as GRLevelX, but the package deal makes up for it in convenience. It's resolution is better than any other currently offered online radar.....NWS, Accuweather, COD etc.

A few questions and concerns:
- Why the splatter pattern (elongated echoes) at the center that includes both ground clutter and echoes? This goes out about 25 miles. I can filter some of this, but it begins to degrade important storm features.
- Can we smooth the radar tops, all I get is big blocks...may be my fault?
- I see two contour color schemes, yours and NWS can more be added?
- Wish you had another layer of state roads as already asked. For storm chasers these roads are very important. The place to turn into the updraft, or escape the gorilla hail. Perhaps just some of the most popular chase states as an option: TX to Dakotas, Iowa, eastern Co, S'rn half of MN etc.

Gene Moore

 

[ssimmons]

Gene,

The "splatter pattern" that you talk about is part of the Level-II radar data. I'm not sure exactly what it is. We decoded the data as we receive it and for what ever reason these splatter patterns seem to be present in the Level-II data.

The echo tops overlay cannot be smoothed. It is pretty low resolution data (4KM) and smoothing doesn't help much with these images. We have decided to only allow smoothing on the reflectivity images.

Currently there are three different color schemes. We might add the capability to add a custom color scale in the future. This has not be decided on.

 

[ssimmons]

Just uploaded a RadarLab HD update. This update includes:

Storm path estimates
Custom color scale
Warnings now split into "Severe Warnings" and "Other Warnings" to help with cluttering

You can read more about it here.

 

[ssimmons]

New version of RadarLab HD has been deployed. It includes:

SpotterNetwork
Local Storm Reports
Ability to move around your Real-time lightning coverage area whenever you want.

You can read more about it here.

 

[Scott Taylor]

Nice updates! Thanks

 

[Bill Tabor]

While out chasing the tropical storm Ike today I have a new chase vehicle and have turned off Threatnet for the offseason so decided to run with Radarlab Hd and the gps in order to know my position relative to the storm and view radar. Here are my observations, experiences, and comments for improvement:

For Radarlab HD
Level 2 is pretty hard to load while travelling especially if multiple frames / looped
Cannot abort a download without hard kill on app
While downloading you lose all previous radar displayed until finished download. With poor
connection and animation this is a problem. Radar should remain available during downloads.
Could use separate tabs for different radar sites opened rather than separate loading apps
Problem when you switch radar site you lose your gps, then you have to close app to get and
reinitialize to get it to work again.
To switch site you have to first stop the gps communication then switch site and then reset any
preferences such as color, icon, display track and whether or not you want gps to display
Gps is a bit hard to get to work. If you choose the wrong com setting such as port then you
actually have to close Radarlab Hd and restart before choosing the proper one.
Composite reflectivity is faster loading. Recommend a level III base reflectivity for quicker
load and smaller files if a person doesn't want to use level 2 because of bandwidth issues.
Other than that once running gps works good; however more roads are needed to actually use it
for navigation. Additionally smaller roads should probably only show up when zoomed in, or
like Threatnet make the detail adjustable based on preference.